


Hate is a Strong Word (But I Really, Really, Really Don’t Like You)

by ThrillingDetectiveTales



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Coitus Interruptus, Gen, M/M, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:47:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23101177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThrillingDetectiveTales/pseuds/ThrillingDetectiveTales
Summary: “Fuck!” Tommy gritted through clenched teeth, hands curled into furious claws. “Ihatehim!” His face was redder than a sun-ripened tomato, the tendons in his neck standing out in bright white slashes. “He thinks he’s such hot shit just because they handed him a platoon the minute his boots hit the tarmac! And now he’s probably gonna go make an appeal to Winters, and Winters is gonna side with him like healwaysdoes, and I’ll have made the effort for nothing. Not a single goddamn thing.”
Relationships: Lynn “Buck” Compton & Edward Shames, Lynn “Buck” Compton & Thomas Peacock, Thomas Peacock/Edward Shames
Comments: 16
Kudos: 25
Collections: Loose Lips Sink Ships Prompt Meme





	Hate is a Strong Word (But I Really, Really, Really Don’t Like You)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the “Fill a Prompt, Save Three” event over on the Loose Lips Sink Ships Prompt Meme. Prompt was:
> 
> “BAND OF BROTHERS, Edward Shames/Thomas Peacock, ‘I fucking hate Buck Compton.’”
> 
> This was a really fun one to write because Peacock and Shames are largely blank slates—their characterization comes from  
> what very little of them I could find in the books plus their very minor appearances in the show, with a liberal helping of personal flair to give them a little dimension. It was also really neat to write about a character I love from the perspective of a couple of characters who decidedly don’t enjoy him at all.
> 
> This was peeked at several times by several people but has not been properly beta-read so all errors are mine. Please be prepared for foul language, explicit nudity, and period-typical queer terminology in a couple of places.

It was nearing lunchtime on a lazy Thursday when Tommy came storming into the billet he and Ed were sharing on their stand-down in Aldbourne, riding a wave of crisp English air and heavy, tromping footfalls. He was as prim and pressed as ever, hair parted to one side and brown curls combed back off his forehead in a handsome wave with his tie cinched high on his neck, a new silver bar gleaming at each lapel. 1st Lieutenant looked good on him, Ed considered, though the overall picture was somewhat tarnished by the ugly scowl twisting Tommy’s mouth as he hissed a colorful stream of invective through his neat white teeth.

“Day that bad already?” Ed asked from where he was hunched over the makeshift desk in the corner, flashing Tommy a smirk over his shoulder. 

The desk was little more than a couple of shipping crates turned onto their sides with a lopsided piece of plywood balanced on top, but it more than suited for use in completing the occasional piece of paperwork or penning a letter home. Ed had spent the better part of his morning attempting the latter, but he hadn’t gotten far. 

Trying to give an overview of his activities that would make it past the censors was an exercise in futility, and there wasn’t altogether much to be said about his promotion to 2d Lieutenant that hadn’t already been espoused a hundred times over by much more talented authors than Ed considered himself to be. He certainly wouldn't be bragging about his wartime romance, even if he might've liked to. Ed hadn't known he could go for another fellow until he met Tommy, and he doubted his family would take kindly to that news, which was to say nothing of their superiors—especially considering that the man in question was another officer.

Ed sat up and rolled his shoulders, setting his pencil aside and shaking his hand out as he turned on the wooden stool so he could face Tommy properly.

“Worse, if you can believe it,” Tommy groaned, shoulders hunching as he crossed his arms over his chest. His blue eyes were dark and miserable over his frown, cheeks flushed and wind-bitten.

“What happened?”

“I’ll tell you what happened.” Tommy turned to stalk a little further into the room, holding his hands out at his sides and tilting his head back to peer at the ceiling like he was addressing his grievance to a greater power. “Same thing as always happens: Buck fucking Compton." He dropped heavily onto one of the narrow mattresses and put his head in his hands.

It was always a little funny to hear Tommy swear. He looked as squeaky clean as a choirboy—and had actually served with the youth chorus at his hometown cathedral for a number of years—but possessed an extensive and highly nuanced grasp of gutter vernacular that surfaced whenever he was tired or angry or stressed. High-strung as Tommy was, he was in one or more of those states fairly often, though he did his best to keep a lid on any impropriety in front of the men.

Ed—who was Tommy’s polar opposite in a lot of ways, from the scruff he would be sporting come five o’clock no matter how close a shave he managed in the morning to his general ham-fisted approach to leadership—had no problem laying into his men at volume in front of God and the U.S. Army and everyone else, not that it did him much good. They weren't any fonder of Ed than they were of Tommy, but neither did the vague animosity get under Ed's skin or eat at him quite the same way it seemed to plague Tommy.

“What’d he do this time?” Ed sighed, pushing himself up off the stool and moving to sit down next to Tommy on the bed so their sides were pressed together, shoulder to hip, knees brushing. Tommy leaned over into him with a choked sound of frustration and Ed got an arm around his shoulders, rubbing his hand in soothing strokes up and down Tommy’s bicep. 

“C’mon, sweetheart,” he coaxed, turning his face to drop a kiss against Tommy’s hair and casting a quick glance to the door—shut and locked. Good. “Whatever it is, it can’t be _that_ bad.”

“It’s not,” Tommy mumbled into his hands. He scrubbed his palms over his face and then let them fall to his lap, though he left his cheek resting against Ed’s shoulder. “Or that's what popular opinion would lead me to believe, anyway. It seemed plenty bad to me, but,” he conceded, with a shrug, “maybe I don’t know my standards of conduct as well as I thought.” He sounded downright despondent and Ed’s heart twinged against his ribs.

“What happened?” he pressed.

Tommy heaved a sigh through his nose, a warm gust of breath curling over Ed’s collar. His lashes were long and tawny, casting his hooded eyes a shade darker than normal as he explained, “I was making my rounds this morning, and I overheard a couple of the guys talking about how the noncoms had secreted some local girls into their rooms.”

Ed’s eyebrows jumped and he let out a low whistle. “Wow,” he appraised, reluctantly impressed. “Sons of bitches got stones, I’ll give ‘em that.”

"Do _not_ let them hear you say that," Tommy chided with a smirk, swatting a hand absently at Ed’s chest. “Anyway, I go down there to try and smoke them out, only - ” he paused and clenched his jaw so tight his chin jutted forward. His nostrils flared and he shook his head, hair rustling against the cotton of Ed’s blouse. “Only it turns out Buck fucking Compton got there first, to _warn_ the bastards so they could weasel their way out of it.”

Ed scoffed. That did seem very in keeping with Compton’s usual modus operandi—he employed a soft, amiable hand with the enlisted men that Ed, a pugnacious five feet, eleven inches of prickly Virginia carpenter, had never been able to quite figure out. At first, Ed had sort of figured it was a standard trick of higher education, seeing as friendly-and-approachable was the same way Tommy tried to do things, only it didn’t seem to work very well for him either.

The truth of the matter was that Ed might've liked Compton, too, if they'd met under different circumstances. He was an outgoing sort who liked to have a good time, and Ed enjoyed a night on the town as much as the next guy, but something about all of Compton's pomp and swagger didn't suit the rigid hierarchy of the U.S. Army. His lackadaisical approach to social conduct with the enlisted men certainly made it seem as though he felt himself above the rules, which was just like a moneyed man. 

Ed, who came from humbler means and looked upon the military as a sort of equalizing force, had not appreciated this quirk of character upon first meeting Compton, and dove headlong into dislike when Compton made a quiet, off-color aside about Tommy's fussiness during a briefing.

Tommy had still been just plain old 2d Lieutenant Peacock, back then—a polite and particular officer from Washington state who'd caught Ed's eye around base—but Ed hadn't appreciated the tenor of Compton's tone or the way his words had made Tommy flinch and stand brittle for the rest of the meeting. Ed had gone out of his way to befriend Tommy after that exchange, which had worked out pretty well in his favor in the long run, if you asked him.

"I'm sorry you had to let 'em slide," Ed murmured, giving Tommy's shoulder a vigorous rub and pressing a longer, lingering kiss to his hair. "I know you hate it when folks get away with bad behavior."

"Well," Tommy fidgeted a little and straightened up, flicking Ed a sheepish, prideful glance, "they didn't, actually."

Ed leaned back to meet his eye. "You got 'em?"  
Tommy bit his lip, fighting back a smile. His blue eyes were dancing, the big hazel fleck in the left one gleaming like burnished gold. He lifted one shoulder in a shrug and confessed, "I guess they stuck the girls in the attic when they heard I was coming by, which might've worked except the floor was all rotted. So, while I was grilling Sergeant Guarnere about his company, the heel of one of their shoes comes poking down through the ceiling."

"No."

"Hand to God," Tommy laughed, raising a palm into the air and shaking his head. "You should've seen the look on Gonorrhea's face. I thought he was going to have a fit."

Ed chuckled and whistled again. "So you _did_ get 'em?" he clarified, giving Tommy's shoulder an affectionate squeeze.

Tommy nodded. "There were two of them up there, in these animal pattern tights. Pretty things, and bright, too, so Lord only knows why they were slumming it with Easy Company. I think Guarnere must've been covering for someone—told me both girls were there for him." He huffed and rolled his eyes. "As if I'd believe that crock. Anyway, he wouldn't give up his buddy, so I reported him to Winters for the girls, and Malarkey and a couple of the other non-coms as accomplices for not reporting him themselves."

"That doesn't sound like such a bad day to me," Ed observed. "Compton try to talk you out of it?"

Tommy rolled his eyes. "Of course he did." He squared his shoulders a bit and put on a gruff, slightly rasping voice that didn't actually sound very like Compton at all as he mocked, "'C'mon Tom, it's just a couple of guys having a little fun! Why don't you cut 'em some slack, huh?'" He shook his head, planting the side of one hand into the upturned palm of the other, and continued on in his own voice, "The rules exist for a reason! They're there to protect the men, even from themselves, if need be. I know it's not fun, but we're at war. It isn't _supposed_ to be fun! Or did I skip the day at OCS when they were handing out that manual?"

Ed, who had seen Tommy's extensive collection of robustly annotated military documentation firsthand, snorted. "As though you've ever missed out on a manual in your entire goddamn life." 

Tommy graced him with a small, sincere smile, and Ed put his hands behind him on the mattress and leaned back, knocking his knee into Tommy's. "You got your man, even with Compton there trying to throw a wrench into the works, so what's with all the bluster, huh?"

Tommy shook his head, the eager, righteous energy that had been coursing through him just seconds before dimming under a wave of melancholy as he slumped into himself. Ed almost regretted asking, but he knew that if he didn't get it out of him, Tommy would chew on whatever was bothering him for days until he finally boiled over about it. Best to bleed that wound now, even if it hurt.

"The rules are there to keep the men safe," Tommy said slowly, brow furrowed in thought, "and I enforce the rules." He sighed and reached up to rub at the hinge of his jaw. "I guess I just don't understand how that makes me the bad guy." He huffed a soft, bitter laugh. "Didn't think I would ever be the type of guy you'd want to be warned about."

The silence that settled between them was thick and painful, crushing in close. For all that he was perpetually wound up tighter than a clock spring, Tommy wasn't the crying type, thank God, but the dejection radiating off of him in waves was nearly palpable. Ed, who was not particularly gifted in the ways of comfort, watched Tommy for a long moment, tracing the curves and planes of his face, the pert bow of his mouth, and then kicked out with his foot so their toes tapped together.

Tommy looked over, and Ed flashed him a sweet, syrupy grin. "I sure could've used one."

Tommy scoffed and rolled his eyes, turning his face away, but he was smiling despite himself so Ed figured he was on the right track.

"I'm serious," Ed continued. "Should've told me when I went through the line at basic. Handed over a stack of O.D.'s and a notice that there was one Thomas Peacock up at OCS who was gonna ruin my life one day."

"I did no such thing," Tommy protested with an affronted grin, shoving at Ed's shoulder while Ed laughed.

"You did!" he insisted. "Absolutely leveled it." He got one paw around Tommy's wrist and laid back on the mattress, tugging Tommy down with him. Tommy grumbled but went willingly, and after a few seconds of awkward shifting they were curled up together, Ed's chin in Tommy's hair and Tommy's nose against Ed's throat. His breath was wet and warm, raising little swathes of gooseflesh on Ed's skin. "Mind you," Ed said, and tightened his arms around Tommy's back, "that ain't a complaint."

Tommy snorted and Ed shivered at the heat of it. "Sure as hell sounds like one," he muttered, but Ed could tell by the lilt of his tone that he wasn't truly upset. They lay there in silence for a while, sharing each others' air, and then Tommy nuzzled against Ed's throat and slipped his leg between Ed's own and muttered, "It's a simple rule to follow, right? No girls in the rooms.”

Ed hummed, dragging his knuckles up the line of Tommy's spine and grinning at the contented rumble that pulled up from Tommy's chest. "I don't know," he admitted. "I can understand it, a little."

Tommy made a soft, displeased sound and disentangled himself just enough to frown up at Ed, all disappointed and betrayed. His eyes were soft and sleepy, and Ed couldn't quite help reaching up to press his thumb into the pouty cushion of Tommy's lower lip.

"Don't look at me like that," he said, and moved to nudge his knuckles against the sharp, sweet point of Tommy's chin. "It was a stupid risk to take, sneaking the girls in there, but I can't say I wouldn't do the same, if it meant I'd get to have you hidden up in my attic."

Tommy tucked his tongue into his cheek—the way he always did when he was fighting one of those beaming smiles—and flicked his gaze away, shaking his head. He tucked his face back into Ed's throat and groused, "You're unbelievable."

"Unbelievably _suave,"_ Ed corrected, and Tommy laughed and pressed a sloppy kiss to the hinge of Ed's jaw, but he didn't disagree.

“How long ‘til noon chow?” Tommy murmured, warm against Ed’s throat. Ed craned his head back, searching for the little wooden clock on the bedside table jammed into the corner. He squinted his way through reading the numbers upside down while Tommy trailed a couple of soft, absent kisses across his skin.

“Little under an hour,” he reported, curling one hand around Tommy’s hip in a hopeful squeeze. “Why, you got somewhere to be?”

“Something to do, more like,” Tommy corrected, angelic grin curling into something sharper and sweeter. He tucked one finger over the waistband of Ed’s trousers and arched an eyebrow. “As long as you think you can keep quiet.”

Ed mimed locking his lips with a key and throwing it over his shoulder. Tommy huffed a laugh and shifted down a little bit to start working at Ed’s belt buckle.

“Been thinking about this all morning,” he admitted, face flushing as he palmed Ed’s cock through the placket of his slacks. 

Ed was still soft but stirring with interest, both from the muted sensation of Tommy’s touch and from the vision he made, slid halfway down the bed with those pale eyes sparkling over his pert, pink mouth. He tugged Ed’s blouse and undershirt up out of his waistband and undid his trousers, smirking, “Doesn’t seem fair that the noncoms get to have all the fun.”

“Guess we’ll just have to even the score,” Ed teased, voice rasping a little. He curled one hand around the back of Tommy’s neck, stroking his thumb through the downy fuzz at his hairline.

“Don’t muss it,” Tommy warned. He was particular about a lot of things but none so much as his hair, and the familiar reprimand made Ed grin. Tommy worked his hand into Ed’s underwear, those long, elegant fingers brushing warm over Ed’s half-hard prick.

Ed choked on a breath and pushed up into his grip. He sighed out a swear and lifted up onto his elbow for a better view while Tommy fished his cock out through the front of his shorts.

“Quiet,” Tommy repeated, low and intent.

Ed snorted and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, and bit back a groan when Tommy ducked down to mouth at his dick. He licked along the length, hot and slick, and Ed’s cock twitched and swelled under the attention. “Fuck, Tommy.”

Tommy stopped just long enough to raise his head, pinching viciously at Ed’s thigh with his free hand and cutting him a sharp glare. _“Hush.”_

Ed licked his lips and nodded, and Tommy went back to work. Soft and sweet as his mouth was, Tommy excelled at sucking cock, and seemed by all measures to take immense enjoyment in the act. Ed was still working up to it, mostly—the couple of times he’d managed to suck Tommy off had been sloppy and amateurish, Ed’s wobbly willpower fortified by a tremendous measure of booze. 

More often than not, he and Tommy were content to rub off against each other, breathing harsh and desperate into the sticky air between them, though Ed gathered that there was a breadth of other activities they might get up to together, most of which he could only vaguely imagine. Tommy, by his claims, had accumulated a remarkably thorough education on the subject in the fairy bars and back alleys of Washington State during his tenure as a student, but Ed hadn’t quite mustered the courage to ask him about all that yet. An ugly, jealous part of him seethed every time he thought of Tommy sighing one of those sweet moans past some stranger’s teeth.

Tommy took him into his mouth for real and Ed fisted his free hand in the mattress, fighting the immediate impulse to rock up into that wet heat. Having had a dick in his mouth once or twice, Ed could understand why dames didn’t care much for that, and neither was Tommy a fan, fastidious in cock-sucking as he was in everything else.

It was a blissful few moments of Tommy’s hand and mouth sliding over him in tandem while Ed shuddered against the mattress and did his best to keep his lip buttoned per Tommy’s orders—until a brisk rap sounded at the door, making the loose knob rattle, and someone barked, “Peacock!”

Ed jumped at the unexpected intrusion and Tommy choked a yelp around his dick, teeth scraping in a sharp sting as he pulled off to bury a cough in his elbow.

Ed hissed and scrambled to a seated position, tucking himself clumsily away, and Tommy rolled to the side to let him up, both of them staring in abject horror across the room. Another knock sounded and the voice came again, “Hey Peacock! You got a second?”

“Shit,” Tommy muttered, scrubbing the cuff of his sleeve over his jaw and mouth, which were both wet and rosy with friction. He cut a gaze over at Ed, brow furrowed, and grimaced, “That’s Compton.”

“So answer it!” Ed whispered. He couldn’t very well do it himself, as he was wrestling his belt back into place and stuffing his blouse down underneath it.

Tommy nodded and sprang to his feet. “Just - ” he hollered, and then coughed when his voice broke. He cleared his throat into the side of his fist, face flushing with embarrassment, and tried again, “Just a second!”

Ed scurried over to the desk, which at least put him largely behind the door and kept his flagging erection out of sight—not that he was worried about it persisting much longer. He heard the bolt turn and the creak of the hinges as the door swung open, and then Tommy was asking in his dryest, prissiest tone, “Can I help you, Lieutenant?”

Ed bit his lip against the sudden crest of laughter burbling behind his sternum. Lord, but he loved that ornery little bastard.

“Look,” Compton said, and there was the scuff of a bootheel as somebody moved. Probably Tommy stepping back, if Ed had to guess. Compton liked to loom, all six foot spare of him. Ed had never been able to figure out if it was intimidation or laziness that drove the quirk, but he knew that Tommy—who barely topped 5’8—didn’t much care for it, either way.

Sure enough, when Ed risked a glance over his shoulder, Compton was slouched against the doorframe with one of his feet crossed over the other at the ankle, leaning in and wielding that all-American grin like a weapon as he explained, “I was hoping you and I could have a little chat about this whole situation with the ladies in the attic before you take it upstairs.”

Tommy, standing a careful two feet away with his back a rigid line and his arms crossed tight over his chest, shook his head once, quick. “I’m afraid I’ve already escalated the matter to Captain Winters.”

Compton scoffed, blinking like he’d just been slapped, and then his grin sprawled even wider. “What,” he asked, eyebrows arching in disbelief, “really?”

Tommy gave a shallow nod and Compton huffed a mean little laugh.

“Jesus Christ, Tom,” he snapped, “you couldn’t even give it ten minutes?” He reached up to pinch at the bridge of his nose, digging his thumb and forefinger into the corners of his eyes.

Tommy’s jaw worked for a second and he spat in a low, icy tenor, “If you came here just to belittle my decisions, I have more important things to do with my time.”

Ed gave up all pretense of polite ignorance, turning his full attention to the spectacle.

Compton hastened to apologize, bringing his hands up in front of him with the palms forward. “Sorry,” he sighed. “Sorry, I just - Listen, Tom, I think it’s in your best interest to build trust with these guys, and I’m not so sure the way to go about doing that is to rake them over the coals for every minor infraction - ”

“What about sneaking women into their barracks constitutes a ‘minor’ infraction?” Tommy interrupted, cutting a hand through the air to halt Compton’s monologue. “If I’m remembering my rules and regulations correctly, the presence of the fairer sex within a soldier’s private billet is strictly prohibited, regardless of rank.”

“Well, sure, but - ” Compton hedged, in that wheedling drawl that always itched under Ed’s skin like a marching line of fire ants. Tommy cut him off again.

“If I’m expected to earn the trust of the men under my command, it only seems fair that they be expected to earn mine in return. Failure to adhere to long-established fraternization guidelines hardly appears the appropriate avenue by which to achieve that, don’t you agree?”

“You’re looking at this all wrong, Tom,” Compton insisted, voice a low, intimate rumble that made the hair on the back of Ed’s neck stand up. He curled his hands into fists against his thighs and tucked his tongue between his teeth and his lower lip to keep from saying something he might regret, or worse, taking a swing at Compton from halfway behind the door. “These guys, they like to push the boundaries. It’s part of what makes them such exceptional soldiers. Better to indulge that instinct a little back here, where it’s safe, than to risk a wild hair taking hold out on the front lines and getting the boys into real trouble, isn’t it?”

“Pushing boundaries is one thing,” Tommy said. “Exhibiting reckless disregard for standard policy is an animal of entirely different stripes.”

“They were just having a little fun!” Compton pushed up off the doorframe and threw his arms out to his sides. “Surely you’re at least familiar with the concept, even if you’ve made it abundantly clear that you’d never deign to participate in the act yourself.”

“I have plenty of fun!” Tommy scowled. “And I do it without breaking the rules. If the men are such a cut above, it should be no great effort for them to accomplish the same.”

“They’re men, not machines! If you want to look after a charge that never falters or missteps, go build tanks with the Engineer Corps.”

“I already told Winters!” Tommy stamped his boot against the floor, hard, which seemed to draw Compton up short. “Even if I wanted to let this one slide—which - ” he held up a finger “ - I _don’t—_ it’s out of my hands! The men made their beds when they snuck those girls into their billet, and now they’ll have to lie in them. Alone.”

“I’m telling you Tom,” Compton growled, and took a pointed step forward into Tommy’s space, “you’re making a mistake.”

Tommy swallowed, so thick and slow that Ed could see it at a distance, and stumbled back.

Ed was on his feet before he even thought about moving, stalking forward with the powerful boxer’s stride he’d picked up watching his pa prowl around through all the halls of his youth. He squeezed his fist shut tight and then stretched his fingers back out and curled them in again. Starting a fight with a fellow officer warranted a kick down the ranks, but it might be worth the trouble to drag Compton down a rung or two with him.

“Problem?” Ed asked, halting at Tommy’s shoulder. Compton straightened up when Ed appeared from behind the door, frowning and lifting his chin in salutation.

“Shames,” he greeted. “Didn’t realize you were here.”

Ed arched an eyebrow and held out his hands, wagging him in the air as if he were a magician. Compton rolled his eyes.

“No,” Tommy said. “No problem. Lieutenant Compton was just leaving. Isn’t that right?”

“What do you know?” Compton asked, affecting a big, fake grin and glancing down at his watch. “Looks like I’ve got somewhere to be.” He stiffened to neat attention, but his narrow gaze and the sickly sharp edge of his smirk belied any respect he might have been angling to express. He snapped off a couple of sloppy salutes and excused himself with a drawled, “Lieutenants. It’s been a _real_ treat.”

He went down the hallway whistling, the son of a bitch, strolling along with his hands in his pockets like he hadn’t just ruined their entire afternoon. Tommy waited until Compton was ducking out through the front door of the quaint little row house before he slammed the bedroom door shut and latched it so hard Ed was a little concerned that the wood might splinter.

“Fuck!” Tommy gritted through clenched teeth, hands curled into furious claws. “I _hate_ him!” His face was redder than a sun-ripened tomato, the tendons in his neck standing out in bright white slashes. “He thinks he’s such hot shit just because they handed him a platoon the minute his boots hit the tarmac! And now he’s probably gonna go make an appeal to Winters, and Winters is gonna side with him like he _always_ does, and I’ll have made the effort for nothing. Not a single goddamn thing.”

Ed didn’t argue, because it was probably true, much as it pained him to admit it, and because he didn’t want to talk about Compton anymore now that they’d finally gotten rid of him. He got a hand over Tommy’s shoulder and reeled him in until he was tucked securely into the circle of Ed’s arms with his face buried against Ed’s chest, fingers fisted tight in the fabric of his blouse.

“Fuck,” Tommy said again, but it was a quieter, more painful thing. He shook his head, and his voice was gummy with emotion when he sighed, “I can’t believe the bastard interrupted us.”

Ed huffed a laugh into Tommy’s hair. “I can.”

They stood there for awhile, Tommy taking the occasional slow, shuddering breath as he came back to himself while Ed rubbed his back and dropped kisses against the crown of his head. The clocked ticked on, until Tommy heaved a breath and mumbled, “Sorry, Eddie.”

Ed tightened his arms, just for a second, and shrugged. The motion ruffled Tommy’s slicked-back coif and he made a soft, displeased sound in the back of his throat.

“You can pay me back later,” Ed assured him. “And hey,” he leaned back, just far enough to see Tommy’s face, and wagged his eyebrows, “if you’re lucky I might even return the favor.”

Tommy snorted and rolled his eyes but his cheeks flushed a satisfying pink, freckles burning a shade or two darker under the stain. “C’mon,” he patted a hand against Ed’s abdomen and gently disentangled himself from Ed’s grip, wandering over to unlock the door. “We’re gonna be late to the mess.”

“Rather stick around here and make our own mess,” Ed grumbled amiably, and stepped out into the hallway on the ebullient wave of Tommy’s laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!!!


End file.
